


today at 8:11 (the psl remix)

by flyingthesky



Category: Glee, High School Musical (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Broadway, Broadway References, Broadway Star Kurt Hummel, Broadway Star Rachel Berry, Broadway Star Ryan Evans, Canon Character of Color, Canon Gay Character, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, M/M, POV Alternating, Remixed, Romance, Starbucks, there's a lot of broadway is what these tags are trying to tell you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-25
Updated: 2019-12-25
Packaged: 2021-02-18 03:06:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21970651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingthesky/pseuds/flyingthesky
Summary: Pumpkin Spice Lattes are a basic bitch drink ordered by people who think "influencer" is a personality and Chad hates everyone who orders one but, you know. An exception can be made for a cute boy if that cute boy also happens to be a Broadway Star.
Relationships: Chad Danforth/Ryan Evans
Comments: 18
Kudos: 323





	today at 8:11 (the psl remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Danforth, the Latte Boy](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/544834) by flyingthesky. 



> merry fuckin christmas, i wrote something for nobody but myself. if you're thinking to yourself “hasn't reili already written this fic?” the answer to that is yes. yes i did. ten years ago. so for the tenth anniversary of “Danforth, the Latte Boy” i rewrote the entire thing. 
> 
> why? bc it'll be funny as fuck. hope lmm is enjoying the mindlink we appear to have right about now!

It’s 8:11.

Time has crawled to an absolute stop which is about normal for a morning shift at Starbucks, in Chad’s experience. There’s always simultaneously too much going on and absolutely nothing going on during the morning caffeine rush, which is how Chad almost misses the guy that Martha’s been texting him about for the three days he was off.

“Chad,” Martha says. When he doesn’t immediately respond, Martha elbows him in the kidneys. “Chad, look! Mr. 8:11 PSL is here—he’s hot, right?”

Looking up, Chad scans the room for whoever Martha’s talking about while he waits for the breakfast sandwich “Jen, one n” ordered to heat up. Nobody strikes him as _that_ hot, and he’s about to tell Martha that when the line shifts and Chad sees him. He’s looking down at his phone and the light from outside is hitting his hair at just the right angle to make it look like spun gold. When he looks up, Chad immediately thinks _oh fuck me_ and almost forgets that he’s standing in the middle of a Starbucks, serving baked goods and coffee.

Fortunately, the oven dings and Chad is immediately thrust back into reality. He grabs the sandwich and sticks it in a bag, folding the top over before calling out the order. “Jen, one n” (not to be confused with their other regulars, “Jenn, two n’s” or “Jennifer”) takes the sandwich from him and smiles.

“Have a nice day, Chad!”

“You too, Jen.” Chad waves as she leaves. “See you tomorrow!”

“I’m going to let you make his drink,” Martha says as she reaches past him for a lid. “Because I’m a nice person, and also I’m pretty sure he’s gay so me flirting with him would be a tragedy.”

“Hey,” Chad says, grabbing the order for the hot guy from Rory, “it’s rude to guess people’s sexualities.”

“Yesterday he was wearing a sweatshirt that said _Elio, Elio, Elio_ on it and hot pink, velour track pants,” Martha says. She calls out a drink order for Anthony. “If he’s not gay, his boyfriend is.”

Chad rolls his eyes, moving to make the PSL the guy ordered. He’s not one for stereotypes, but he has to admit Martha has a point. There’s only so gay a person can dress before they give up the right to complain if someone assumes they’re gay and they’re not and he feels like that line is pairing hot pink velour track pants with a sweatshirt that says _Elio, Elio, Elio_ across the front. That’s the kind of outfit gays wear to subtly signal to other gays that they’d be DTF—which in this case could be either “down to fuck” or “down to friend.”

It’s September, which means this is approximately the 800th PSL he’s made this season and listen. On the one hand? He’s glad it’s not another fucking unicorn-tie-dye-dragon-whatever. A PSL is a drink that Chad could make blindfolded with one hand tied behind his back. On the other hand? _It’s a PSL_.

The pumpkin spice latte is the most basic-bitch fall drink known to man. It’s the very first viral drink. It tastes a lot like dirt and nothing like a pumpkin pie in Chad’s opinion. Anybody who orders a PSL in the year of our lord 2019 is probably a person who thinks “influencer” is an entire personality or who’s joined at least one MLM, either of which would make Mr. 8:11 PSL—whose name is actually _Ryan_ , according to the cup that Chad is holding—infinitely less attractive than a person who would have the decency to just order a cup of coffee like a regular American citizen instead of a glorified milkshake.

It’s possible that Chad isn’t working at Starbucks because he, like, enjoys making coffee. It’s possible that it was just the only place that would hire him and he’s been working at Starbucks for three years, which is about six months longer than his longest relationship, meaning that he’s used to it and it’s something that mostly pays the bills while he works on building up his side hustle.

“PSL for Ryan?” Chad can see Ryan, looking down at his phone and frowning in concentration. “Ryan? Your drink is ready.”

There’s a slightly delayed reaction, but Ryan finally looks up and quickly pockets his phone before walking forward and taking his drink. The fact that he’s not going to immediately instagram his PSL almost makes Chad feel guilty for his uncharitable thoughts earlier, but also the guy is wearing a Hamilton shirt so in Chad’s opinion he’s probably still a basic bitch.

“Thank you,” Ryan says. His eyes flick over to Chad’s nametag, which says _Dawg_ on it. “Dog? That can’t be your real name.”

“Absolutely not.” He does occasionally wear a nametag with his actual name on it, but he has less of those than he does the ones that say various weird nicknames. “It’s what my best friend calls me, though.”

That is 100% a lie. Troy has never in his life ever called Chad “Dawg,” but nobody has to know that. It makes a convenient excuse whenever someone asks about the tag, and that way Chad doesn’t have to explain his locker room nickname in public.

“Huh.” Ryan blinks and then seems to remember he has somewhere to be. “Thank you, Dog.”

As he leaves, Martha comes up next to Chad and calls out a drink for Lorenzo. She and Lorenzo have some kind of weird flirtation thing going on that he doesn’t understand, so instead he grabs an order from Rory and sets about making another PSL, this time for Jojo. It’s his third PSL of the shift, and he has a distinct feeling that this is going to be one of the killer shifts where life sucks and he would really enjoy if the Chitauri _actually_ invaded New York right now.

At least that would put him out of his misery.

——

In the grand scheme of things, Ryan has better things to be doing at 8:11 than getting coffee at a Starbucks. Even if it’s PSL season and it’s _tradition_ to get a PSL when the leaves just start turning colors. There is nothing that screams “fall” more than the cinnamon-clove taste of pumpkin spice anything, but the PSL is a _classic_ and since Ryan’s not going to see his family for Thanksgiving this year he feels entitled to at least a few traditions. Sometimes Ryan misses Sharpay and even though a drink can’t fix the subtle ache of not being near his twin, it helps. Stupidly, Ryan thinks of PSLs as “their” drink and since he’s probably not going to see Sharpay until the year’s already over thanks to them both being busy af, drinking a bunch of PSLs is the best he can do. That doesn’t mean he’s not putting off other stuff to get them, though.

Technically, he has quite a few better things to be doing on any given morning than getting a PSL at Starbucks. Seeing as he’s currently late for rehearsal at the Gershwin Theatre, that would probably be the number one better thing, but it’s not a _huge_ deal. He knows that rehearsal today is mostly about settling the new Elphaba in, so it’s probably just going to be her and the Galinda working together for a while. That’s the more important relationship in their show, even though he supposes that Elphaba and Fiyero are also important. Some people might say more important, but that’s never been how Ryan’s played it and Rachel would kill him if he ever even tried.

Nobody even notices when he slips into rehearsal, everyone mainly milling around while Rachel and the new Elphaba are singing “For Good.” He’s not awake enough to remember what her name is—he knows she’s fresh from the German cast, but other than that he doesn’t remember much of what Rachel was telling him about her. Rachel talks a lot, and honestly Ryan only pays attention to about a quarter of what she says when she gets into one of her rants. Sitting down next to Kurt, Ryan gestures toward the new girl.

“What’s her name again? And did I miss anything important?”

“Not really,” Kurt says. He holds out half of the pastry he’s been eating. “Rachel’s been surprisingly well-behaved today. New girl’s name is Francesca.”

“ _Danke schön_.” Ryan takes the pastry, because neither of them can afford to eat a whole one but also there’s this place by Kurt’s apartment that makes the _best_ anything baked. “We’re not doing a full rehearsal, right?”

“No, that’s Monday but we’re up ten minutes for ‘Dancing Through Life,’ so you might want to eat faster.”

It’s not like Ryan’s never eaten breakfast faster, but he grimly wishes he didn’t have to do that as often as he does. The coffee helps and being late was absolutely worth it for that. Also for seeing the incredibly hot barista that was working today. While he’s eating, Ryan watches the new girl. She’s good, and it’s nice to have a fresh face in the cast. Nessarose is also new, also fresh from the German cast, which is probably why they’re all up for “Dancing Through Life.”

They recently changed the blocking for it too, so it’s a good chance for the rest of the cast to get used to the new choreography. Ryan plays Fiyero a lot more physically than a lot of people, and the number was changed when the director realized that. There’s a lot more dance moves now, since that’s Ryan’s real strength, and he hopes that the new girls won’t find it too different from whatever blocking they’re used to. Most of the changes were for him and Rachel, though, so it shouldn’t be that hard.

Finishing off the rest of the pastry that Kurt handed him, Ryan sets his half-finished coffee down and rolls out his shoulders. He’ll do a full stretch later, before the show, but for right now he just needs to be loose enough to get through a single song. It’s not ideal, but it’ll do. He really needs to stop turning his alarm off in the morning, but also his bed is very warm and he’s never been much of a morning person. Kurt’s actually been stretching like a good dancer which makes him way more ready when they’re called onto the stage.

“Late again, I see,” Rachel says as he takes his mark. She’s lost a lot of the snotty attitude that she had at Juilliard, but sometimes she’s still kind of bitchy. “Do I need to start picking you up in the morning?”

“I’m not used to waking up this early,” Ryan replies. He slings the messenger bag Kurt hands him across his body. “I didn’t miss anything important.”

Rachel looks like she wants to say something else, but then they’re starting and it’s not the _best_ he’s ever performed but he hits all his marks and everything goes relatively smoothly. The problem with being a long-standing member of a musical like Wicked is that he just. It’s a routine. There’s no real thinking when Ryan’s dancing, which leaves him a lot of time to think about other stuff. Like, for example, how hot the barista at Starbucks was. Are they still considered baristas if they’re male? Baristo? He should probably know this, given that he’s done multiple stints in operas that were _in_ Italian, but he doesn’t.

None of that is the point. The point is that the stupid barista at Starbucks was also stupidly hot and, unfortunately, probably straight. That’s just a guess, but nobody who gets called “Dawg” by their friends is anything but the kind of straight that Ryan’s spent his whole life trying to avoid. Which is super unfortunate, because he was _so_ hot and, unfortunately, Ryan’s exact type. The world is a cruel, cruel place that calls for early call times and makes baristas way hotter than they should be.

—--

“Come on, Chad.” Gabriella waves the flyer in front of Chad’s face. “It’ll be fun.”

“Why can’t you just take Troy?” Chad’s trying not to sound like a whiny baby, but he doesn’t understand why Gabriella has targeted him for this particular form of torture. “You know he loves that stuff. He’s the one who was in all the school musicals when we were in high school.”

“He has a coaching thing this weekend.”

There’s a certain sadness in Gabriella’s voice, the one that she always gets whenever she and Troy have to be apart for more than five minutes, which is how Chad can tell she’s probably not lying about Troy being busy. Which sucks, because if she had just been making up the excuse, Chad wouldn’t have felt bad telling her that he didn’t want to go see a stupid Broadway show on his off day because musicals are, y’know. Dumb. They’re dumb and he definitely doesn’t secretly like them or anything, okay? He definitely hasn’t already seen the show that Gabriella won tickets for.

“Troy, your girl’s the worst.” He looks over at Troy, who looks up from grading papers. “Are you sure you’re busy this weekend?”

“Yeah, we have a game upstate. I have to be there for the team.” Troy looks apologetic, but Chad can tell he doesn’t understand why he’s making such a big deal about this. Truthfully, Chad doesn’t know either. Maybe it’s just leftover toxic masculinity from his failed career in sports. “You know you don’t have to say _yes_ to her, right? Gabriella would never make you do something you don’t want to. I just told her you’d probably have fun.”

Chad looks between Gabriella, who looks unbearably and genuinely hopeful, and his best friend. Troy’s gone back to grading papers, and Chad can feel his resolve crumbling. He probably would have fun going to a show with Gabriella, actually. He loves Wicked. It was the first musical his mom ever took him to go see, because she thought he’d like it better than Phantom of the Opera and, well. She wasn’t wrong. Not than Phantom’s not great or anything, but it’s, uh. It’s just not his favorite, is all.

Even as a grown adult, Chad’s found that it’s hard to get over your inherent fear of the Phantom born of the fact that your mom kept a picture of Michael Crawford as the Phantom in the fridge for your entire childhood. Not on the fridge, like a normal person. _In_ the fridge. And then, every time you went for a midnight snack, the Phantom was there. Judging.

That’s a personal problem, though, and it doesn’t have anything to do with Wicked.

“Okay,” Chad says. He rolls his eyes to make it seem like he doesn’t care about this as much as he does. “I’ll go see Wicked with you. We can go get dinner before the show.”

“Really?” Gabriella brightens up, and Chad thinks that maybe he could probably stand to make some new friends he hasn’t known since high school. Or ones that work with him. God, his life is sad. “Great! I’ll text you the details of everything once I know more and we can decide where we want to eat and transportation.”

The timer goes off, and Gabriella lets out a soft _oh_ before brushing past Chad to turn it off and take whatever she made out of the oven. There’s some kind of miracle to the way Gabriella always manages to actually _cook_ something for their weekly Wednesday dinners, even though she’s always super busy working on her PhD. She told him it was stress relief, once, which he sort of understood once the weekly dinner went from being the same stuff they’d been eating for years into weird, experimental dishes that Gabriella found on Pinterest.

They have a shared Pinterest board now where they just pin anything that looks remotely interesting. Gabriella has tried to get Troy to sign up for Pinterest and contribute too, but he’s continuously baffled by social media like an old person, even though he’s literally the youngest out of the three of them. Chad thinks it’s kind of endearing, but only when he’s not trying to get a hold of Troy and has to call him because he’s not responding to texts. Who even calls people anymore? Calling people is the worst.

“What’s for dinner this week?” Troy’s put away the papers and has wandered over to their dining room table. He sits down next to Chad. “Please tell me it’s got protein in it this time.”

“It’s not a salad,” Gabriella says, which is decidedly not a confirmation on the protein front. “I made lasagna.”

She sets the casserole dish down in the center of the table and Chad eyes it warily. Gabriella’s a good cook, but not every recipe is salvagable by skill alone. This one at least looks like it’s edible, unlike some of the things they’ve tried in the past. Like, well. If Chad’s being honest, they were mostly dishes by vegans who have apparently forgotten what good food tastes like.

He loves a good Meatless Monday, but there are definitely vegans out there who are cutting watermelon up and calling it “watermelon fries” and some of their recipes are just bad. They’re just bad and he doesn’t care how many calories using avocado instead of egg in baked goods cuts, it tastes gross and the texture always comes out awful. He’d rather just work off the extra carbs, honestly.

“Stop looking at it like it’s going to kill you.” Gabriella sighs and cuts herself the first piece. “It’s a _regular_ lasagna. I got the recipe from Troy’s mother.”

Chad and Troy share a glance over the table. The Bolton family lasagna was a nightmare, but they weren’t about to tell Gabriella that. Besides, they’d been keeping the secret that Mrs. Bolton couldn’t cook for fifteen years and, if Chad had anything to say about it, they’d be keeping it to their grave.

—-- 

There’s a lot of things that you can only count on a sibling for, Ryan’s found. So on his fifth consecutive day of going to the Starbucks (this time _earlier_ , so Rachel has less to bitch at him about) purely to see the hot barista, Ryan figures that he, perhaps, has something of a problem and there is only one person he trusts to tell him the truth about the actual, you know. Extent. Of his problem.

“How come you never call me just to talk?” Sharpay doesn’t even bother with pleasantries, which is a habit she’s picked up since moving to Los Angeles. It suits her, though, so Ryan never mentions it. “You only ever call me when you need advice. Never ‘congrats on landing a new role’ or ‘I heard you got a new boyfriend’ or just ‘hey, sis, how have you been doing.’ Honestly, it’s like we never talk anymore.”

“It’s nice to hear from you too, Shar.” Ryan rolls his eyes, even though he’s aware that Sharpay can’t see him. “How’s Hollywood treating you? I hear you got cast in a new show and you’re dating your co-star, which is obviously fabricated PR. I talked to Peyton yesterday and he updated me on your life.”

“You always talk to Peyton instead of me! I’m your sister. I’m your _twin_.” Sharpay huffs, and Ryan doesn’t reiterate for the fifth time that he usually ends up talking to Peyton first because Peyton is currently living in his spare bedroom while he’s working on a project in New York. “So, what sisterly advice do you need this time? Chop, chop. I don’t have all day.”

Ryan pauses for a moment, unsure of how to word what he wants to say. It’s not exactly—he knows he has a problem. He doesn’t need advice about the fact that he’s currently waking up early to catch a glimpse of a guy who he doesn’t even know the name of—it’s very Les Mis. It’s very much like when he did a stint on the national tour as Marius and every night he would look at Cosette and sing _oh god, for shame—I do not even know your name_ like he really meant it.

“I think I’m stalking my local Starbucks barista.” Sharpay says nothing, so Ryan continues: “Would it be in poor taste to ask him out?”

“I can’t believe you called me for this,” Sharpay says. She makes a disgusted noise just as Peyton comes back into the apartment. “I cannot _believe_ you.”

“Is that Sharpay?” Peyton sets down his backpack and heads into the apartment’s tiny kitchenette. “Tell her I’ll FaceTime her later.”

“Peyton says he’ll FaceTime you later,” Ryan repeats, while Sharpay’s making outraged noises on the other end of the line. “Are you actually going to give me advice, or should I just hang up now?”

“Don’t you dare hang up on me, Ryan!” Sharpay’s voice is shrill and as much as Ryan sometimes misses his sister, he thinks he’ll never miss her hysterics. “Yes, of _course_ it’s in poor taste to ask him out. What are you even _thinking_? Why would you even ask me this?”

“In my defense,” Ryan says, aware that he has no defense, “I didn’t _intentionally_ start stalking him. He’s just there every morning when I go get my coffee and so sometimes we, you know. Chat? A little?”

“Sure.” Sharpay would be glaring at him if he was FaceTiming her, which is precisely why he didn’t do that. “So, what’s his name?”

“Um. Well, see. That’s the problem? I don’t know it?”

“You. You don’t know your Barista’s name,” Sharpay says, clearly exasperated, “and you want to ask him out. Is he even, like. Does he even give off _vibes_?”

Ryan is silent, which just sets Sharpay off again. He’s very much _aware_ of how nonsense his whole plan is sounding, and to be perfectly honest Sharpay’s reaction is uncalled for. Even if it’s literally what he called her for.

Peyton pats Ryan on the head when he crosses the apartment, carrying a plate with a sandwich on it. Of all the things about his sister’s life, Ryan is the most glad that she found someone who understands how to be supportive of her while allowing her to have the limelight. It’s a tricky balance, and Ryan only manages because they’re _twins_ so he knows things about Sharpay that it’s possible even she doesn’t know about herself. That’s different from the easy way that Peyton supports her, and Ryan’s glad to see that one of them has their shit together regarding relationships.

“Okay,” Sharpay says after a deep breath, “okay. You, dear brother, are an idiot. You don’t know this guy’s name. You’re pretty sure he’s straight. _He is your barista_ and you’ve admitted to stalking him. What are we going to do, now that we’ve had this talk?”

“We’re going to not ask the barista out?”

He’s _pretty_ sure that’s the right answer. Even if it’s definitely _not_ the answer he would go for. Listen, he’s just really gay and really attracted to the hot barista he sees every morning who is definitely not named “Dawg,” “C-Dawg,” or “Danny.” That last one had seemed promising until he’d asked and gotten the very amused reply that it was also a nickname. He’d tried Daniel and then been told Danny was a nickname coming from _Danforth_ , which was. Helpful? Sort of? In that technically, Ryan now knew mystery barista’s _last_ name at least.

“You are _absolutely_ not going to ask the barista out.” Sharpay pauses, like she’s thinking. “Also you should call me more often. And call mother too, she complained last week that she hadn’t heard from you in _ages_ and you know how tiresome she gets when she thinks we’re neglecting her.”

“Yeah.” Ryan winces. He really should call their mother more often. “I’ll call her later. Bye, Sharpay.”

Sharpay hangs up without saying anything, which Ryan probably deserved.

—--

Most of the people that Chad sees in Starbucks on a day-to-day basis are busy New Yorkers who have better things to do than talk to him. He knows all the regulars by name, of course, but most of the time they just thank him and get one with their day. Ryan, however, is apparently different.

“Okay,” Ryan says as he takes his PSL from Chad. “I’ve got a new guess: Charlie.”

“Bzzt.” Chad tries not to laugh at the way Ryan pouts. It’s cute. If Chad were, like, into white gays who own multiple pairs of velour track pants, he would be into Ryan. “Are you just going through every C-name you can think of? Do you just have, like, babynames.com open in a tab on your phone?”

“Chase. Cash,” Ryan says, instead of answering Chad’s question. “Cooper. Chadwick.” 

“That last one is the closest you’ve gotten.” It’s true, even if Chad’s pretty sure that Ryan only said it because he’d written today’s nametag in Wakandan. “Have a nice day, Ryan.”

“I’m going to get it eventually.” Ryan sounds determined, and that’s the reason Chad hasn’t just told him what his name is. It’s funnier this way and telling Ryan would take all the fun out of their interactions. “See you tomorrow, not-Dog.”

Ryan leaves, and Martha bumps her shoulder against Chad’s. She’s grinning, and Chad rolls his eyes. Apparently, his weird kinda-flirtation thing with Ryan is the only gossip going on in the store which Chad thinks is dumb because whatever’s going on between Martha and Lorenzo seems like it’s _way_ more interesting.

“You know that guy, like, sings and stuff right?” Rory hands Chad an order for Molly, and he starts preparing it while Rory continues talking. “I performed with him at 54 Below once.”

“Hang on now,” Martha says, “you perform at 54 Below? We’ve been working together for four years and you’ve never invited me to a show?”

“I play cello,” Rory says. It’s in the same tone that Rory says everything about himself, as if it’s a forgone conclusion and not anything surprising. Which, Chad supposes, it wouldn’t be to him. He hands Martha an order. “It’d be weird if I invited people to come see me play.”

“Molly? Your order is ready,” Chad says, ignoring the argument that Rory and Martha have gotten into over pulses of the espresso machine. “Molly?”

Molly takes her PSL and banana bread, flashing Chad a brief smile before leaving. Rory hands him another order, this one for Nick. He’s only like two hours into his six-hour shift and the morning rush still hasn’t quite petered out. That’s the worst part about working morning shifts, honestly. New York never sleeps, and neither does Starbucks so Chad’s running mostly on muscle memory. He doesn’t really have the energy to care about whatever Rory and Martha are arguing about.

Actually, it totally slips his mind until he’s on break and Rory passes him a scrap of paper with something scribbled onto it. Only years of reading Troy’s terrible handwriting allow Chad to actually make out what it says: _search: Ryan Evans & Rachel Berry - “Don’t Do Sadness/Blue Wind” (Spring Awakening; Duncan Sheik) on yt_. Which, you know. Feels kind of weird and stalkerish, if he’s being honest? But at the same time, he can admit that Rory’s statement earlier was intriguing. 

So he, you know. Pulls it up on his phone and watches it. And, uh. Well. He’s super gay, so there’s that, but something catches his eye in the comments section of the video.

> **JIMIN IS MY BIAS** _1 year ago_  
>  i cant believe these 2 are the single best fiyero and galinda to ever exist
>
>> **ben platt’s wicked bootlegs** _1 year ago_  
>  * aaron tveit and megan hilty
>> 
>> fixed it for you
>> 
>>  **JIMIN IS MY BIAS** _1 year ago_  
>  @ben platt’s wicked bootlegs listen they’re good but the absolute callousness? that ryan and rachel play fieyro and galinda with? *chef’s kiss* perfection honestly
>> 
>> they understand that elphaba is the only person in the entire show with any morals lmao

And then he has to go look up Ryan in Wicked, which is an entire rabbithole that has Martha come looking for him to tell him that his break is over and honestly? He’s so fucked. He’s absolutely _fucked_ and for a brief, wild moment Chad contemplates cancelling on Gabriella because he can’t do this. He can’t see Ryan do _that_ on stage and not immediately expire on the spot.

“You okay, Chad?” Martha touches her hand to his shoulder, and Chad tries to pull himself together. He just needs to get himself in the game, that’s all. “You look like someone just died.”

“I’m fine,” he says. It comes out a little hoarse, but he manages to smile. “Sorry. My friend just sent me a surprising text.”

“Okay.” Martha doesn’t look entirely convinced, but capitalism means that there’s nothing either of them can really do about that. “It’s pretty dead out there if you want to do some cleaning up in the stockroom or refill the creamer pitchers. You know. Something easy?”

“Yeah, I’ll go restock everything.” Chad’s grateful that Martha is actually his friend—she’s a work friend, sure, but Chad likes to think they’re actually friends too. “Thanks, Martha.”

It’s mindless work, which is usually Chad’s favorite kind of work, but it unfortunately leaves him with a lot of time to think about the _incredibly_ tight pants that Fiyero wears and how good Ryan looks in them. Usually when he comes into the shop, he’s wearing sweatpants and a slightly too large sweatshirt, like it was borrowed from someone else and it doesn’t fit quite right. Presumably, that’s a sign he has a boyfriend and Chad should stop this weird crush he’s developing in its tracks.

Unfortunately, that’s far easier said than done.

—-- 

“Sam says you have to stop stealing his sweatshirts when you come over and then never returning them,” Kurt says as he gracefully bends forward into some weird stretch that’s probably actually a yoga pose. Actually, no. That’s definitely a yoga pose—Ryan’s spent enough years doing yoga with his mother to recognize most of the poses. “He apparently couldn’t find a single sweatshirt this morning and resorted to wearing two flannel shirts which was a _look_ , but I’m not sure it was a good one.”

Ryan is about to protest that he hasn’t stolen _that_ many of Sam’s sweatshirts, but he thinks better of it. He has definitely stolen that many of Sam’s sweatshirts, and he should probably start giving them back and buy his own sweatshirts with his own money that he has because, you know. He has a fucking trust fund, and he really doesn’t need to be stealing the sweatshirts he’s pretty sure Sam buys from the clearance section of Target even though Sam _also_ has a trust fund. At the same time, though, Sam’s sweatshirts are soft and warm and they give off intense “I have a boyfriend I stole this from” vibes, which keeps random guys from hitting on Ryan, which is a plus.

“I could buy him new sweatshirts,” Ryan says instead. Kurt rises out of standing forward bend into mountain and raises an eyebrow at Ryan. “Okay, fine. I’ll bring his sweatshirts back this weekend.”

“You two have such a weird relationship.” Kurt moves from mountain into one of the warrior poses. “Like, I know Finn and I were the gossip mill’s favorite ‘weird family’ in high school, but why don’t we ever talk about you and your weird relationship with your cousin?”

“It’s not that weird.” He doesn’t mention that the reason they have a weird relationship is that they’re not actually cousins. That’s the lie they’ve been living with since they were children, so it almost doesn’t feel like a lie anymore—it’s just easier to say that Sam is his cousin than that Sam is technically his _father’s_ cousin. “We’ve known each other our entire lives, is all.”

“You’re from Lima, Ryan. Sam’s from Nashville.” Kurt’s frowning at Ryan, and Ryan says nothing about how his family made their money. It’s not like it’s a _secret_ , but he doesn’t enjoy dragging it out in the open. “Does your family just have weird yearly reunions or something?”

“Where do you think we went every winter break?” Ryan rolls his shoulders back, trying to loosen them. Stretching in the winter always seems to take twice as long. He clears his throat and lets the slightest hint of the Nashville accent he’s mostly dropped come through. “Come on now. I grew up in Nashville, actually.”

Kurt pauses in his stretches to just stare at Ryan, which is probably to be expected. Technically, Ryan’s never flat-out said that his family only moved to Lima when he and Sharpay were ten. He’s also never told Kurt directly how Sam ended up moving to Lima. That’s not really his story to tell, after all. It involves him—or his family, at any rate—but it’s not his right to tell Kurt that Sam had to move to Lima because his mother died and there was . . . There had been a lot to take care of, that’s all.

“We’ve known each other for like _fifteen years_ ,” Kurt says. He waves his arms around wildly for a moment. “I can’t _believe_ you! I’m. I’m going to tell Rachel that you’ve been lying to us about being from Lima for over a decade.”

“She knows.” Ryan feels kind of bad about this, actually, but he just assumed that Sam told Kurt about this at some point. It seems like the sort of thing that should come up when you’re dating someone. “I thought you did too? I didn’t go to elementary school with you guys.”

“I thought that was because you’re two years older!” Kurt flops down onto the floor of their green room, somehow always managing to be dramatic. Sometimes, Ryan wonders how everyone didn’t know that Kurt was gay. “How was I supposed to know that you just didn’t even live in Lima? I thought Sam was joking when he said you all used to live in the same house in Nashville.”

“No, that’s true. We all used to live in the same house.” He could say something about how the house was probably large enough to fit two more families in it, but it feels rude to flaunt his family’s wealth right now. Lima isn’t totally rural or anything, but there’s a gulf between Ryan’s upbringing and Kurt’s that’s impossible to cross. “We all pretty much lived together until my dad moved for, you know. Work reasons.”

That’s not quite the truth, but “work reasons” is how Ryan’s been trained to answer questions about why his family moved from the Evans empire in Nashville to Lima, Ohio. The actual truth is much more complicated and something it’s better if too many people don’t know about. Ryan doesn’t even technically know the full brunt of the complicated legal maneuvering that had to be done before his grandmother died.

“I stand by my earlier statement: why did we never talk about your weird relationship with your cousin? You all lived in the same house? That’s weird.”

“It’s not any weirder than when Finn and his mom moved in with your family.” Ryan slides into a split and bends to the left. “Actually, it’s less weird? Because Sam and I are actually related.”

Kurt shakes his head and gets back up from the floor, dusting himself off. He might be right about it being weird, but Ryan wouldn’t know because his family has always lived in each other’s pockets. Even Peyton living in his apartment while he’s in New York had gotten some comments about how that it was kind of weird how his sister’s boyfriend was living in his apartment for three months. It had just made sense, though. The Evans fortune wasn’t made by wasting money where it wasn’t necessary.

Money can buy small creature comforts, like his completely unnecessary pumpkin spice lattes, but his parents did try to teach them fiscal responsibility. Ryan maybe learned that lesson better than Sharpay, but even Sharpay is something of a deal hunter when it comes down to it. Owning a bunch of houses you never use or living in a completely different apartment when your family also lives in town is just odd.

“You’re so weird sometimes,” Kurt says. “I don’t get you.”

—--

“I’m so excited.” Gabriella loops her arm through Chad’s as they walk from the subway to the theatre. “Wicked is one of my favorite musicals, but I haven’t seen it on Broadway before. They say the current cast is really good.”

They are, in Chad’s opinion, _too_ good. He feels a bit like he might die before act 2 if the extremely shaky and blown out bootleg he watched last night made him lie awake for two hours just thinking about it. That’s not the sort of thing Chad is going to tell Gabriella, though, so he makes a noncommittal noise.

“I figure they must be good if they got hired.”

“That’s not what I mean and you know it.” Gabriella bumps her weight into him, and Chad obligingly sways to the side. “I know you’re into musicals, Mr. ‘I Don’t Want To Go, But Troy Says I’ve Seen Wicked Three Times.’ You don’t have to pretend to be a bro all the time, you know.”

“Okay, okay. The guy playing Fiyero comes into our Starbucks every morning and apparently Rory knows him.” Chad tries to think how to word this without saying he has a crush on Ryan and, subsequently, has watched like twenty hours worth of YouTube videos about him in the past three days. “He’s good. I don’t love the girl playing Galinda, but she’s got a good voice, and she plays off his Fiyero well so. You know. I think it’ll be fun.”

“You researched them!” She stumbles, laughing, and Chad catches her without thinking. It’s weird. He distinctly remembers telling Troy that Gabriella wasn’t going to last forever in high school and yet here she is, forever later. They’re getting _married_ soon and she’s basically Chad’s closest friend besides Troy. “I can’t _believe_ you tried to get me to take someone else.”

Chad makes a mock-offended noise as they walk up to will-call and Gabriella gathers the tickets. He hasn’t gone to a show in a while because it’s been a rough couple of years. Tearing his ACL fucked up a lot of his plans in life, honestly, and that was even before getting mildly disowned for being gay and ending up sleeping on the couch of Troy’s apartment for a month before landing the Starbucks job. He graduated, yeah. Gabriella wouldn’t let him drop out, and he’s grateful to her for it but it’s just.

He’s not where he thought he’d be, and it’s been hard to come to terms with. Gabriella understands that better than Troy does, Chad knows, because she’s not exactly where she thought she’d be either. Not that she wasn’t always going to be brilliant, but going straight into a PhD isn’t exactly what she planned on, Chad thinks. Life has taken them both slightly to the left of the beaten path, and they’re doing the best they can.

“We have to take a selfie,” Gabriella says once they’ve made it into the theatre proper. She waves her phone around and drags Chad toward some kind of display. “I promised Troy we’d take pictures.”

“Is this for Instagram, or just Troy?” Chad takes Gabriella’s phone from here, fiddling with the settings for a moment so they both don’t get whitewashed. “Because if it’s for Insta, we’re gonna need to be extra cute.”

“Just take the picture, Chad.”

Gabriella smacks him lightly and Chad laughs, obligingly setting up the shot so they both look good and taking several—just in case one of them blinks. He hands the phone back to Gabriella, who immediately flips through them and texts one to Troy. She’ll post on her Instagram later, Chad knows, but Troy usually gets blow-by-blow updates whenever Gabriella and Chad hang out without him. It’s sickeningly cute and domestic, actually, and at least 50% of the reasons Chad moved out.

Chad looks over the display while Gabriella’s doing that. It’s sort of interesting, but it’s the sort of thing that his mom would care about more than he does. He’s not really one to care about the history of something—it’s important, sure, but most history isn’t that interesting and the parts that are are rarely the parts that anyone wants to talk about.

Eventually they get settled into their seats and the show starts and it’s. Yeah, Chad has seen Wicked before but there’s some magic to seeing a show. Seeing shows live is different—not better, despite what some hardcore people say, just different. It might be worse, in Chad’s opinion, because sitting in a theatre with hundreds of other people means that he can’t react to what’s happening unless it’s “appropriate.” There're all kinds of propriety rules and maybe Chad only thinks about this because he and Gabriella are two brown people in a sea of white people.

That’s really what Troy doesn’t get about them. He tries, and he understands better than some people what it’s like to be constantly reminded that you’re different from everyone else because your skin is a different color, but there’s a gap between knowing that and knowing how every small failure feels like you’ve let down everybody who helped you try and succeed.

Part of Chad is just glad that Gabriella didn’t get tickets to go see In The Heights. He thinks they both probably would have been crying the very moment that Nina sang “Hey guys, it’s me! The biggest disappointment you know.” because, in a way, they’re both just Nina. Neither of them dropped out of college, but both of them came close and even things a little to the left of where you’ve been can hit too close to home.

Elphaba’s greenness is about as close as Chad is willing to get to reality in his escapist fantasy because ultimately, it’s still sort of a power fantasy. Even as she’s been denigrated, Chad knows that Elphaba is out there and fighting for what she believes in and that’s worth something. The fact that you can be a different color and use power to take control of your own destiny, even if you use it to do the wrong thing, is a powerful fantasy and whoever’s playing Elphaba really sells it. He already knows he’s probably going to go on another deep dive on her—apparently his life’s at a place where he can spend some free time getting back into his actual hobbies: knowing too much about Broadway stars and pretending he doesn’t when anybody asks him about it.

Old habits really do die hard, Chad supposes.

—- 

Two show days are always a little rough, but the new cast is settling in and as Ryan changes out of his costume into his street clothes, Rachel comes in and leans against the doorway.

“We’re doing stage door,” she says without preamble. “You skipped out last week.”

“I didn’t skip out.” Ryan pulls his jacket on and zips it up. “I was on vocal rest.”

“Sure.” Rachel rolls her eyes and points to Kurt’s empty seat. “Where did Kurt go? I thought we were all getting food later.”

“We are,” Ryan says. He pulls on his hat and grabs his bag. “He’s meeting us there—he had to go rescue Sam from a thing he doesn’t want to be at.”

“Typical.” Rachel turns to leave. “You have five minutes to be out there or I’ll tell embarrassing stories about when we were in Spring Awakening together!”

“I’ll tell embarrassing stories about Lima if you do that,” Ryan yells after her. He hasn’t ever actually done it, but that’s because they all don’t talk about Lima as much as possible. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten your younger years.”

Actually, he might just tell everyone the story about that time they all competed for the right to sing “Defying Gravity.” It’s not actually embarrassing so much as it is funny now that they’re _all_ in Wicked and _none_ of them are playing Elphaba. Technically Rachel won that battle, Ryan supposes, since she’s sings _part_ of the song as Galinda. He still thinks that Kurt sounds better singing it, though.

Stepping out into New York fall is Ryan’s favorite thing to do. It’s just cold enough that it’s pleasant, but not cold enough that he feels like he might die. Rachel’s already signing things and chatting with people, and he casually steps into place next to her. Someone gives him a piece of fanart, and Ryan thanks her profusely before putting it in his bag. He’s just chatting with people, telling them about how he’s known Rachel for _ever_ when he finally catches sight of not-Dawg.

“Not-Dog!” Ryan waves. “What brings you here?”

“Not-Dog?” The tiny girl standing next to Not-Dawg peers up at him. “What’s he talking about, Chad?”

“I told you,” apparently-Chad says, “he comes to our Starbucks every morning. ‘sup, Ryan.”

“I can’t believe I didn’t guess Chad.” Ryan’s holding someone’s Playbill, and he quickly signs it before he forgets to give it back. “Of course you’d be a Chad. You never answered my question.”

“We saw your show,” the tiny girl standing next to Chad says. She’s full of energy, everything she says enthusiastic, and Ryan immediately likes her. “You were both amazing!”

“Thank you,” Rachel says. She preens, like she always does when she’s complimented. “Would you like me to sign your Playbill?”

The tiny girl holds out her Playbill for Rachel, and Ryan tilts his head towards Chad, who offers his own for Ryan to sign. Ryan hands it back, their fingers touching, and Ryan swallows nervously. It would be weird to make a pass at Chad here and now, in front of so many people, but _oh_ how Ryan wants to.

“Here you go. Should I sign your girlfriend’s too?”

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Chad says. He laughs slightly, like the mere idea of her being his girlfriend is hilarious. “Gabriella would probably love that, though. Gabi, let Ryan sign your Playbill.”

Gabriella hands it over enthusiastically, while still talking to Rachel about some show that she was on. Rachel does television, occasionally, even though her main love has always been Broadway. Pretty soon, Ryan thinks, they’re all going to be spread out to different shows again and they won’t see each other as often. It sucks, but Ryan’s also secretly hoping that he and Kurt can get cast as brothers in something. They look enough alike that it would be hilarious.

“Hey,” Ryan says, as he hands back Gabriella’s Playbill, “you should come to our show next month at 54 Below. It’s on the 15th, we’re doing Disney songs.”

“Yeah?” Chad and Gabriella are lingering, but most of the rest of the crowd has dispersed. That’s a relief, because Ryan’s tired and hungry and he wants to leave sooner rather than later. “Bring me a flyer or something tomorrow.”

“Sure,” Ryan says. Rachel loops her arm through his, and Ryan takes that as a subtle hint they’re leaving. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning?”

“I’m off tomorrow,” Chad says, “but I’ll be back in Monday.”

Rachel leads him off, and Ryan waves to the stragglers as they head towards the subway. It’s not until they’re in a crush of people with somewhere to be that she says what Ryan knows she’s been dying to say since they were doing stage door. That’s character growth. In high school, she would have asked him as soon as she thought nobody who cared would overhear them.

“What was that about, Evans? You were _flirting_.”

“We can’t all marry our childhood sweetheart,” Ryan says with a shrug. He and Kurt would never do that anyway—they dated for like three months anyway, then Kurt had moved onto Blaine and Ryan had moved onto Elliott. “I haven’t dated anyone since—oh god, I haven’t dated anyone since I temporarily stole Jesse from you because I was angry.”

“Seriously? That’s sad. _I_ haven’t dated Jesse in like two years.” Rachel’s been married to Finn for going on a year now, so it’s apparently been longer than Ryan thought. “You need to get out more, Ryan.”

“That’s what everyone’s been telling me.” He called his mother yesterday, and she basically said the same thing. “It just hasn’t been on my mind. I’ve been busy with other things—I have like five auditions for upcoming projects. You know how it is.”

“Listen,” Rachel says, steadying herself from the sway of the train by holding onto Ryan’s shoulder, “I know this is going to sound _super_ hypocritical, given that I’ve basically been That Bitch who only cared about her career until recently, but you’re allowed to have a life outside of what we do. It’s okay to slow down—Kurt wouldn’t tell you this, because I don’t think Kurt knows you’re literally independently wealthy, but you can afford to take a break. Not everything is about fame.”

“I know that,” Ryan says. It sounds more like he’s trying to convince himself than anything. “It’s not a big deal.”

Rachel doesn’t seem convinced, but they arrive at their stop and she lets the conversation drop. That too, Ryan thinks, is some kind of character growth.

—--

“Gabriella tells me that you have a crush on some singer?” Troy flops down on Chad’s couch, already fishing for the remote to turn the game. “Is he cute?”

Chad could say something about how Ryan is actually _the_ cutest person, and he has _definitely_ not just spent the past week researching him and making plans to go see the show Ryan invited him to or anything else that might qualify as a little stalkerish, but also Troy is too straight to understand boy talk. That’s kind of what Chad has Gabriella for, she gets it. Troy asks about his crushes the way his dad used to ask about cute girls at school: like an obligation.

“Do you think the Knicks are going to win?”

“Come on, man. We both know our team sucks.” Troy flips through channels before finding the game and letting the remote clatter onto the coffee table. “We haven’t been good since we were both in college.”

“You don’t think RJ Barrett and the other new players could shake it up this season?” Chad knows they probably won’t and he just has to accept that his team currently sucks, but still. “We could make it to the playoffs.”

“You have a better chance of getting a boyfriend than the Knicks have of winning.” Troy looks over at him and Chad hands him the bowl of Doritos. “Seriously: is he cute?”

“He’s cute if you’re into, you know.” Chad waves his hand around, trying to encompass the totality of _twink_. “Gay-gays.”

“Like, as opposed to a straight-gay like you?”

“I’m _bi_ , thanks.” Chad rolls his eyes, aware that Troy knows that. He’s pretty good at remembering that kind of stuff for a straight, cis dude. “Something like that, though. You know, a _Call Me By Your Name_ gay instead of a _Brokeback Mountain_ gay.”

“Wouldn’t you be a _Moonlight_ gay, though?” Troy looks over at Chad, clearly pleased he’s managed this gay shop talk, and Chad laughs. “Aw, come on! That one was good and you know it.”

“Do I look like some kinda repressed gay? I got that shit out of my system when I sucked every dick on the baseball team.” Chad throws a pillow at Troy, who fumbles the catch and instead knocks the pillow to the side. “Give me my chips back, I ain’t letting you eat my Doritos if you’re going to slander me like this.”

Troy rolls his eyes but gives up the Doritos without complaint. It’s not like he doesn’t know that Chad’s lying—they’ve been friends for so long that Troy has to know that there’s basically nothing that he could do that would make Chad stop letting him eat his Doritos. They’re basically brothers at this point, so Chad’s kind of stuck with Troy and vice versa. He already knows he’s best man at Troy’s wedding. Troy didn’t even properly ask, he just kind of invited Chad for a suit fitting and that was that.

“For real, though,” Troy says, “tell me about this boy. It’s been years since you actually, you know. Had a crush that made you all defensive about it.”

“He’s just a guy,” Chad says. He’s trying to play it cool, but Troy just raises an eyebrow. “Okay, fine. He’s hot, I see him like every day at work, he invited me to go see a show he’s doing, and I pretty much want to marry him but that’s going _way_ too fast considering that we only formally met, like. A week ago.”

It’s a _thing_ , and no matter how many times Chad makes fun of Troy because he’s marrying his childhood sweetheart, he’s not really any better. When he falls in love, it’s hard and fast and kind of all-consuming, which can be nice but is also maybe a bit overwhelming for everybody involved.

“So you’re going to see his show, right?” Troy picks up the pillow from the floor and puts it back on the couch. “Then you’re gonna ask him out on a real date.”

“Is that chill? Is that how people do things, or is it weird to just immediately ask if someone wants to go on a date with you?”

“What’s the gay Tinder? Grin-der?” He pronounces it to rhyme with Tinder, which is very heterosexual of him. “Swiping right is basically asking someone to go on a date with you immediately, so that must be what people do.”

“It’s Grindr, and how would you know? You literally haven’t dated anyone new for like fifteen years.” The fact that Troy even knows what a dating app is vaguely blows Chad’s mind. Why would he? Gabriella is _right there_ and they’re getting married. “Your information is like a decade out of date.”

“I talk to teenagers all day,” Troy says, shrugging. Chad guesses that probably does explain it. “Do you know how much of coaching is actually just sitting there and explaining that you gotta get your head in the game and stop worrying about whether Jessica likes you or Cindy will let you take her to prom?”

Chad could say something about how yeah, actually. He does know, because he spent their entire career in sports doing that for Troy. That’s not actually what Troy is saying though, so instead he shoves a Dorito into his mouth so he doesn’t say anything snarky about their junior year when Gabriella transferred in and he had to spend a whole season coaching Troy through a relationship. That’s way in the past so it doesn’t even matter anymore, but Chad’s still glad it sounds like Troy’s getting his own comeuppance with his team.

It eases his mind that apparently dating hasn’t changed that much since he last put himself out there. Honestly, he doesn’t remember the last time he dated someone for real, not just had a casual fuckbuddy kind of thing that was easy and no mess. 

“That’s rough, buddy,” Chad says.

Troy throws the pillow he just put back on the couch at Chad.

—--

“You’re nervous,” Kurt says as he fixes the collar of Ryan’s shirt. “You’ve never in your life had stage fright, so spill. Who’s going to be here that you want to impress?”

“Nobody.” Ryan tries to make it sound casual and doesn’t succeed if the look on Kurt’s face is any indication. “Fine. The hot Starbucks barista will be here. He told me this morning and wished me luck.”

“I can’t believe you, serial boyfriend stealer, have a crush on someone. You don’t do that.” Kurt looks a little concerned. “Are you finally going to settle down? Do I need to give this boy The Talk for you?”

“You’re not my actual brother,” Ryan says, in lieu of an actual answer. “Pretty sure your boyfriend should be doing that, if anyone is.”

Kurt makes a non-committal noise that Ryan recognizes as him being too polite to directly disagree. He straightens Ryan’s tie instead of saying anything and that’s all there is to the conversation until Rachel comes over and impatiently asks Ryan if he’s ready.

“No,” Ryan says. It’s the truth, and Rachel nods like she knows what he means. “But that’s showbiz.”

“You will get laid tonight.” 

Rachel says it like that’s final and then loops her arm around his and leads them over to the table they’ll be sitting at while the other performers are singing. He makes small talk with some people he and Rachel know from their national tour of Spring Awakening. It’s nice, and it keeps him from nervously looking around to see if he can spot Chad.

When he hears Benjamin introduce his duet with Rachel, they both get up and it’s easy. He knows how to play off her, has been doing it for almost a decade, and they’ve barely rehearsed this arrangement but they know how to take cues from each other. Being the Hans to Rachel’s Anna is almost the easiest thing Ryan’s ever done and they bring down the house with “Love Is An Open Door” in a way that reminds Ryan that there’s more to life than a career. Sometimes it’s good to just have fun.

He cheers when Kurt does his best “Let It Go,” which he’d fought Rachel for because they’ve all got their eye on doing Frozen at some point and fighting about Idina Menzel songs is second nature to them at this point. As a whole the show is fun and carefree, exactly as it should be, and Chad finds him afterward, hovering like he wants to let Ryan finish talking to his friends before cutting in. Ryan waves hom over instead.

“This is Chad,” Ryan says, when his friends raise their eyebrows. “He makes sure I’m well-caffeinated.”

“Hey,” Chad says. It’s a little awkward, but that’s fine. “You were all great.”

“Oh, look at the time,” Rachel says. She turns to Kurt. “We should get going. Sam has a thing tomorrow, doesn’t he? It was nice to meet you properly this time, Chad.”

“Hopefully Ryan will invite you to friend-dinner soon.” Kurt smiles in a way that implies that’s not an optional thing. “Rachel’s right, though. We need to get going.”

They leave, and Ryan will kill them for being so unsubtle about it later, but for the moment he just turns to Chad. There’s a lot of things that he could say, of course, but he doesn’t know where to start. There’s a lot of weirdness about the situation and he doesn’t want to call attention to it.

“I liked you better as Marius,” Chad says, instead of anything Ryan expected. He smiles, small and private. “You play a good villain, but I like it better when you’re sincere about being in love.”

“You’ve seen me as Marius?” Ryan tilts his head to the side, because Chad doesn’t strike him as someone who knows anything about musicals. His run as Marius was very short, just filling in for someone else for a few months on the national tour, so someone would have to actually _know_ about his career to bring it up. “I always thought I would’ve made a better Enjolras.”

“Maybe.” Chad shrugs. “I think you have the idealism for it, but you’re a romantic at heart. Marius suits you.”

People have said a lot of things to him over the years, trying to get him into their beds. Chad’s comment may be the single most convincing line that anyone has ever used on him and the worst part about it is that Ryan is almost entirely certain that Chad’s being completely sincere. That’s part of what makes it attractive, if Ryan is being honest with himself.

“I’m going to kiss you,” Ryan says.

He steps into Chad’s space, hands settling on his hips to keep himself steady as he rises up to press their lips together. Chad’s hand comes up to cup the side of his face and Ryan is acutely aware that they’re in public and this shouldn’t get too raunchy even though he _wants_. Reluctantly, Ryan pulls away and smiles up at Chad.

“Does this count as a first date?” Chad sounds amused, and Ryan realizes that he’ll say anything that gets Chad to take him home and fuck him. “Is it moving too fast to ask you to come home with me?”

“If you don’t take me home, I will probably burst into tears.”

That’s maybe a little too real and desperate for how new this thing between them is, and Ryan can only hope that Chad takes the statement as hyperbole rather than fact. He probably wouldn’t cry. Get drunk and wallow, definitely, but he’s reasonably sure that he wouldn’t cry. It hasn’t been _that_ long since he last got laid.

“Well, we can’t have that.” Chad’s moves Ryan’s hand away from his waist and tangles their fingers together. “Come home with me, Ryan.”

“He has burst like the music of angels, the light of the sun,” Ryan says, a little sing-song, “and my life seems to stop as if something is over and something has scarcely begun.”

“Two phantoms in the shadow of the moon,” Chad says, smiling like they’re sharing a secret. “Can people really fall in love so soon?”

“Take me home with you.” Ryan has never wanted anything more than this. “We’ll figure everything else out later.”

—--

They hold hands for the entire subway ride to Chad’s apartment.

Ryan tells him stories about working on various shows, tells him about his twin sister and living in Lima, Ohio. He tells Chad about meeting Lin Manuel-Miranda while being in Chess and trying not to faint from being starstruck. He talks a lot about Newsies, his first show out of Juilliard, and how weird it is to be in a show with his two best friends after years of being in different shows.

In return, Chad tells Ryan about Troy and Gabriella. He talks about playing baseball—something they apparently have in common—and basketball. He tells Ryan about the picture of Michael Crawford in his mother’s fridge. By the time that they make it to Chad’s apartment, it feels less like they’re strangers and more like they’re old friends.

Once they’re inside, once they’ve taken off their coats, Ryan presses Chad to the door and kisses him. His hands are slightly cold where they slip under Chad’s shirt, and that’s fine. That’s perfect, actually, until it isn’t and Chad is guiding Ryan across the apartment to his bedroom. Once they’re there, Ryan strips without preamble and _oh_.

“Like what you see?” Ryan tilts his head to the side, smiling like he hasn’t just blown Chad’s mind. “I’m flexible too.”

“You can’t just say stuff like that.” Chad groans, shucking his shirt in the general direction of his laundry basket. “You’ll kill me before we even get started.”

“Then you’d better get over here sooner rather than later.” Ryan sits on the edge of Chad’s bed, lips quirked up, and beckons Chad. “How do you want to do this? What are you comfortable with?”

There’s uncertainty in Ryan’s voice, for all his breezy quips and eagerness. Chad kicks his jeans away and sinks to his knees, hands settling on Ryan’s knees.

“Hey,” he says, because he thinks he forgot something important, “I’m not experimenting. I got that out of my system when I fucked the entire baseball team in college. What are _you_ comfortable with?”

“You look good on your knees,” Ryan says. It’s not an answer, but Chad understands that it’s Ryan’s way of avoiding the question. “Can I fuck you?”

“It’s been a while,” Chad says, in the interest of honesty, “but yeah. I’m going to blow you first, though.”

He doesn’t wait for direct confirmation, assuming that Ryan will stop him if he really objects. Instead, he pulls a condom from the box under the bed and rolls it down Ryan’s cock before dipping his head down. He cut his teeth on straight boys who tried their best to forget he wasn’t one, so it’s a little surprising when Ryan gently brushes his fingers across Chad’s face. His lips part, like he wants to say something, but he just makes a quiet, choked-off noise. Chad sinks down as far as he can without needing to relax his throat.

Sometime in the future, when the point of this is the blowjob itself and not just the fact that Chad has been thinking about exactly this since he first saw Ryan dressed as Fiyero, Chad will wreck both of them by pulling out all the stops. As it is, it’s not long before Ryan is stopping him, pulling him up from where he’s kneeling and kissing him like that’s all he’s ever wanted in the world.

“Lube,” Ryan says, while they’re both trying to catch their breath. “I need to. We need lube.”

Chad’s brain takes a second to get back online, but then he’s bending and grabbing the lube from the same box under the bed and letting Ryan press him down onto the bed. There’s a surprising amount of strength behind how Ryan manhandles him into position, which Chad belatedly realizes must be because he’s a _dancer_ and of _course_ he’d be strong. Of course he would.

Ryan presses a kiss to Chad’s spine, and Chad is unbearably turned on. The guys he usually picks up, when he picks up guys, are the type who want to get fucked so it’s a little strange to have attention focused on him. He’s so used to being on the other end of this equation that his arms almost give out when Ryan actually starts prepping him. Ryan’s other hand steadies him almost absently, like supporting a significant amount of Chad’s weight isn’t anything difficult, and Chad realizes in that moment that this is much, _much_ deeper than a simple crush. This isn’t just the kind of crush where you just think someone’s cute, this is the “want to wake up every morning next to them willing to tolerate their morning breath” kind of crush.

“ _Ryan_ ” Chad says, and the swallows because he doesn’t know what comes after. “Ryan, I—”

“Shhh.” Ryan kisses his spine again. “I’ve got you. Don’t worry.”

That’s not at all what Chad meant to say, but he can’t form the words to say that either as Ryan adds a second finger. Instead, he just focuses on breathing, like that will keep him from shaking apart at the seams, and the way Ryan keeps a hand on his hip to steady him. It seems like forever and no time at all before Ryan’s at four fingers and Chad can’t come up with words more coherent than _please, please_.

“Okay,” Ryan says, voice wavering, “okay.”

Ryan lines himself up and goes so, _so_ slow that Chad wants to cry. He knows it’s necessary, especially if he wants to walk tomorrow, but that doesn’t mean it’s what he _wants_. Ryan pauses once he’s pulled Chad flush to him and Chad expect him to move but instead Ryan shifts them so Chad is sitting on his lap.

“Like this,” he says, voice a little wrecked. “It’ll be better for you.”

The position is a little awkward and Chad doesn’t quite understand what Ryan’s talking about until Ryan’s hands are on his hips, helping him set a pace, and _oh_. Oh, he understands why because it makes Ryan’s cock hit every single place where Chad wants it and he can’t help the way it makes him moan. The pace Ryan sets is slow and measured, and Chad assumes it’s being easy on him, but when Ryan wraps a hand around him and matches the pace, Chad decides that can’t be the reason. No, the reason must be torture because it’s like being held on the edge of a cliff and being unsure when you’re going to fall.

“Come on,” Ryan says, and Chad does.

—--

When Ryan remembers to check his phone, he winces when he sees a missed call from Peyton. One of the reasons Ryan likes Peyton for Sharpay is that he genuinely cares about both Sharpay and, by extension, Sharpay’s family. He always calls if Ryan doesn’t come home, and Ryan knows he’ll be worried if he doesn’t call back.

“Something wrong?”

“I have to—there’s no way to make this not sound weird. My sister’s boyfriend is temporarily living with me while he’s filming a movie in New York?” Saying it to someone that doesn’t know about how close-knit his family is makes Ryan realize that yeah, it’s a little weird. “I have to call him back so he knows I’m not dead.”

“There’s a bathroom across the hall,” Chad says, instead of anything Ryan expects. “Let him know you’re safe.”

“It’ll be like two seconds,” Ryan says.

He doesn’t bother actually dressing, just walks across the hall and shuts himself into the bathroom while he calls Peyton. Thankfully it hasn’t been long enough that Peyton will be _worried_ worried.

“Hey,” Ryan says when Peyton picks up on the second ring, “sorry, I forgot to tell you I probably wasn’t coming home tonight.”

“No worries.” Peyton laughs. “I just wanted to make sure you didn’t a pick-up or anything. You staying over at Rachel or Kurt’s?”

“Uh.” Theoretically, Ryan could lie and Peyton would probably be none the wiser, but that’s asking for trouble. “No, I’m at. I went home with the barista?”

“The—oh. _Oh_ , Shar’s gonna be so pissed at you.”

“She’ll live.” Ryan rolls his eyes, but he’s not exactly looking forward to that conversation. “Anyway, I’ll be home in the morning.”

“Go get that d,” Peyton says, and the worst part is Ryan doesn’t think he’s saying it ironically. “You deserve it.”

“I’m hanging up on you,” Ryan says. “Goodbye.”

Peyton laughs, and Ryan hangs up. He takes a moment to remember how to breathe before leaving the bathroom and flopping back down on the bed next to Chad. Chad reaches out, gently running his fingers through Ryan’s hair, and Ryan thinks he could get used to that.

“You’re really close with your family, huh?”

“They mean well, but they’re too interested in my life.” Ryan rolls over slightly to look at Chad. There’s a certain soft sadness in his expression, and there’s a story there but Ryan doesn’t want to ask what it is. That’s too deep for two people who barely know each other. “Peyton fits right in.”

“Troy is like that. He’s constantly trying to ask me about guys, but he’s the straightest dude I’ve ever met.” Chad smiles, shifting closer so their noses are almost touching. “Gabriella’s been texting me all night trying to get deets about you. I think it’s a sign that someone really loves you, you know? That you’re ride or die with them.”

“Yeah.”

Ryan kisses him, because he can’t keep himself from doing it. It’s too soon for a round two, but there’s something nice about kissing Chad now that everything is less desperate and frantic. It’s more like exploration, and that’s easy enough to get lost in. They should probably talk, like real adults, because Ryan gets the distinct sense this isn’t a temporary thing between them and it’s probably better to get the thing about. Well. He has to explain about his family, if nothing else, because it’ll come up at some point and it’s probably better to get the independently wealthy conversation out of the way sooner rather than later.

Chad seems content to let him avoid the conversations they should have while they both pretend that this is a casual thing and not a crazy, all-consuming thing that has swept both of them up. They’ll also have to talk about what’s going to happen if Ryan gets a tour next and not another Broadway run or, well. He probably has to give his mother an answer about the music contract thing. He knows it’s a normal thing for musical theatre people to do, record and album or two and go on tour, but it feels a little weird to even consider when he’s spent most of his life actively running away from the music industry.

“You’re thinking too much,” Chad says, breaking him out of his thoughts. “Do you wanna talk about it? Talk about this?”

“I don’t know where to start.” Ryan swallows, a little nervous. “But I guess, um. What are you doing for Christmas?”

“Dinner with Troy and Gabi.” The way Chad says it, like it’s a foregone conclusion, makes something in Ryan’s chest ache. “A couple of our other friends might be there too. You’re welcome too, if you’re not busy.”

“I have a show,” Ryan says. Sharpay was busy filming, so he’d just planned on doing the family thing at a later date and it didn’t seem like such a weird thing to be working on Christmas day but it makes this conversation a little weird. “We’re having a cast party thing in the afternoon, though. Would you, um. Would you like to come?”

“Would it be weird to bring me? I’m not, like. A theatre person.”

“Kurt’s bringing Sam.” Ryan could also say that Rachel is bringing Finn, but Sam’s the one that Chad’s already met, however briefly. “It’s not a big deal, it’s just like. An office Christmas party, but everyone sings on key.”

“Sure.” Chad touches their foreheads together, and it’s weird that it feels unspeakably intimate when they’ve literally fucked. “I’ve always wanted to get into an argument about _Love Never Dies_ at a party.”

“Yeah? The girl who plays Elphaba was in the German production. She played Meg.”

“Ouch.” Chad winces, and Ryan had about the same reaction when Francesca told him so he gets it. “There’s parts of the show that I think are fun or whatever, but old man Webber seriously did Meg dirty. Which is probably because he thinks the Phantom is the hero? I think? It feels like he thinks the Phantom is the hero in the same way what’s his face. You know, _The Last Five Years_? Whoever wrote that absolutely thinks Jaime deserves sympathy—probably because it’s just thinly-veiled fanfic about his own life.”

“I turned down the movie they made of that when they asked me because I hate Jaime so much.” He’s never told anybody the reason, only that he turned it down to take the run on Les Miserables instead. “You’re probably right though. I think Webber thinks of himself as the Phantom and that’s why he gives Christine and the Phantom a kid.”

“You’d play a dangerous Jaime.” Chad’s hand wraps around the back of Ryan’s neck, like he means to kiss Ryan. “I think I’d actually feel sorry for your Jaime.”

“ _Though I don’t know what tomorrow’s bringing_ ,” he sings, because the song feels appropriate and it’s the only one from the show he doesn’t hate, “ _I’ve got a singular impression things are moving too fast._ ”

“It’s just the next ten minutes,” Chad says.

He kisses Ryan like a promise, and Ryan’s never wanted anything more.

—--

They go on a dinner date that’s actually the two of them eating take-out in Ryan’s green room between two shows and it feels weird for him to be there, but Ryan insists it’s fine as long as he leaves before call time. Kurt apparently smuggles Sam in all the time, when he’s free. It’s easier that way, Ryan explains, because then they don’t have to get fully undressed and respectable for going out into the real world.

“So you’re coming to our Christmas party,” Kurt says once he’s finished eating. He hasn’t actually inserted himself into their conversation thus far, but Chad’s been informed that Kurt is one of Ryan’s oldest friends and he’s _also_ weirdly invested in Ryan’s life. “We’re also doing a New Year’s thing.”

“Yeah?” Chad tilts his head, assuming that being invited to something must mean something good. “Going to see the ball drop?”

“God, no.” Ryan laughs, shaking his head. “We did that _one_ time in college and never again. Everyone just sits on the stage drinking and then someone will probably get on the Defying Gravity rig and tie a disco ball to it and we’ll pretend that’s the ball.”

“Sounds nice. I usually don’t do anything for New Year’s Eve, so I’m free.” Chad holds out his hand and Ryan hands him his empty takeout container to toss. “Assuming I’m invited?”

“Of course you’re invited.” Kurt rolls his eyes. “Why wouldn’t you be invited?”

“Dunno, because we’ve only been dating for like two weeks?”

“We’re all queer here,” Kurt says with great authority as he starts stretching. “Lesbians have usually moved in with each other by now, of course you’re invited to New Year’s Eve.”

“Okay, just because Santana and Britney did it doesn’t mean all lesbians are like that.” Ryan shakes his head, and it’s interesting to see Ryan at ease and in his element. There’s a certain brightness to the way he carries himself that makes Chad want to see every possible version of Ryan possible. “Some of them are reasonable people. Kelsi still hasn’t moved in with her girlfriend.”

“Whatever.” Kurt sinks to the floor and stretches to one side before swapping to the other. “You guys are going to get married in the next five years, I’m calling it now.”

“It’ll be at least ten. I have a blood pact with Sharpay. She gets to get married first and make a big production of it, but she and Peyton won’t get married any time soon.” Ryan looks over at him and Chad thinks he would probably marry Ryan tomorrow if Ryan asked. “That’s a little longer than ten minutes, isn’t it?”

“Just a little.” Chad wants to say that he’d be with Ryan forever if that’s what Ryan asked for, but that feels too much like a confession and they’re attempting to take things at a slightly slower pace. It feels like maybe they should get to know each other before they even joke about marriage, but Troy was talking about marriage about ten minutes after he first met Gabriella so Chad feels like this isn’t as weird as it could be. “Although we might have to start planning now if you want some crazy wedding.”

“I leave the publicity stunts to Shar, mostly.” Ryan shrugs, and from what Ryan’s told him, that’s just how it is between them. Sharpay went into television and movies because she craved the spotlight in a way that Ryan didn’t. He loved his job, of course, but he’s happy being mostly well-known in his little niche rather than more widely. “We could get married in Vegas. It doesn’t matter to me.”

“Ugh, you two are disgusting.” Kurt gets up and cross the room. “I’m abandoning you for Rachel. Be disgusting together until call time.”

“This is just payback for that time you and Sam did it on the kitchen table!”

Kurt gives Ryan the bird, which just makes Ryan laugh. There’s a story there, one that Chad’s sure Ryan would tell him with a little prompting, but he doesn’t ask. Instead, he stands up and steals the seat that Kurt vacated so he can sit next to Ryan.

“You guys are close.”

“He was my first friend in Lima,” Ryan says, expression soft and nostalgic. “I took him under my wing because we were the only two out gays in the entire school and then we ended up in New York together with Rachel and he started dating my cousin so. We’re kind of stuck together now.”

“Sam’s your cousin?” It feels like he should have put that together before now, but the surprising part is less that they’re cousins and more that Sam’s a fairly popular musician who’s. Heir to an entire record label. Which by extension would mean that _Ryan_ is related to. A record company. “Wait, that means you’re an Evans like the family behind Mt. Olympus Records Evans?”

“Something like that?” Ryan winces slightly. “My dad is, um. The current CFO of the company, but both Sharpay and I have never had any interest in—well, I can’t say in music, can I? The company, I guess, so our parents never pushed us. I don’t actually know anything about it.”

It’s clear that Ryan doesn’t really want to talk about the subject from the way he’s curled into himself, and Chad doesn’t know what he should say to fix the situation. He doesn’t know what to say to explain that he doesn’t really care about whether Ryan’s a part of the company, more that he’s weirdly starstruck by the fact that. Well, it feels like Ryan could have chosen anyone. Like there has to be someone better, more rich and famous out there who Ryan would be just as happy with and yet they’re not sitting in Ryan’s green room with him.

“You picked me,” Chad says, aware that it’s not exactly an explanation. “It just hit me.”

“I’m not sure I’m following your train of thought.”

“It’s just, like. Feeling a little Jennifer Lopez in _Maid in Manhattan_.” It’s not a perfect metaphor, but it’s the best Chad can do. “You know, just.”

“Like I’m white savioring you out of your crappy service job and you need to pretend to be something you’re not just to be with me?”

Okay, so it was a _really_ imperfect metaphor. It was also the only romcom he could come up with off the top of his head with an interracial couple that didn’t involve Will Smith, so he’s not sure what that says about both the movie industry and his movie watching habits. Whatever. That’s not even the point.

“No, like you’re too good for me and you’re picking me anyway.” Chad pauses. “Unless you really were planning on white savioring me out of my job at Starbucks.”

“I would support you if you quit,” Ryan says, words careful, “but not really no. Think of it, uh. I was going to say _Pretty Woman_ , but that’s just implying you’re a prostitute which is even worse, so nevermind.”

“Then yeah. Just a little stunned that you would pick me over anyone else in the world, I guess.”

“It goes both ways.” Ryan reaches out, tangling their fingers together. “You still feel too perfect to be real.”

There’s a lot of things Chad could say to that, but instead he leans forward and kisses Ryan.

—-

“He’s not the worst,” Rachel says, partway through their Christmas party.

She’s one of the few people that doesn’t actively care about performing on Christmas Day, since she doesn’t celebrate it in the first place. Hanukkah is running concurrent to Christmas this year, though, so she took the opportunity to show up wearing a horrible blue sweater featuring a menorah with blinking LEDs instead of candle flames. Ryan doesn’t know where she got it, but he suspects that Jesse bought it for her. They’re still friends, weirdly, even after everything weird that’s happened between them.

“I could and have done worse,” Ryan agrees. “Kurt insists we’ll be married in the next five years.”

“I give it ten.” Rachel takes a sip of her tea. “You don’t place a lot of importance on marriage, so it’s not as high priority for you as Kurt thinks. Besides, he’s the one who will be married to Sam in the next five years.”

“They’re not already married?” Chad appears at Ryan’s elbow, holding out a plate of cookies because Chad is kind of the best. “I just assumed they were.”

“They’re basically common-law married,” Rachel says.

She smiles at Ryan and wanders off to go rescue Finn from where he’s been forced into dancing with one of the ensemble members. Ryan eats one of the cookies that Chad’s brought him and resolves to work out so he doesn’t gain weight and stop fitting into his pants. The costume department might kill him if he does—they already have to replace his shirts far more often than they think they should and he’s on their shit list because of it. He’d prefer if they didn’t actually want to murder him.

“Francesca agrees with us that Meg deserved better. Her girlfriend says that Meg and Christine should have ditched the men and moved to New Jersey with Gustave.”

“All the men in Phantom are trash, so yeah. It would have been a better ending, at least.”

“We should go to Coney Island sometime.” Chad takes an opened bottle of sparkling apple cider from a nearby table and refills his glass with it. “It’ll be fun.”

“You probably won’t believe me, but I’ve never been.”

It’s been on his list since he moved to New York, of course, but he’s never actually gotten around to doing it and every time he was free it seemed weird to go by himself. Still, he’s been living in New York for the better part of ten years, so maybe he should have gone by now. It feels like some kind of rite of passage that he hasn’t completed yet.

“Seriously? You’ve never been? I’m taking you this June for the Mermaid Parade.” Chad offers Ryan his glass of sparkling apple cider and Ryan takes a sip before returning it. “You’ll love it. What other typical New Yorker things have you not done? I can’t believe you’ve been here for a decade and you didn’t get your touristy fix when you first moved.”

“Technically,” Ryan says, grinning, “I’ve never been to a Broadway show.”

As absurd as it sounds, it’s the technical truth. He’s seen off-Broadway shows with Kurt and Rachel, and he’s seen shows in other cities like Los Angeles or Chicago while he was on tour but he’s never managed to see a proper Broadway show despite currently being in one. Unless that time they all went to go see _Dear Evan Hansen_ before it was on Broadway proper counts, which he doesn’t think it does. Or attending the Tony Awards every year.

“You’re _in_ a Broadway show! _Ryan_.” Chad laughs, sparkling apple cider sloshing against the sides of his glass. “I can’t believe I have to take a Tony Award Nominated Broadway Actor to go see a Broadway show. We should enter the _Hamilton_ lottery for the full experience.”

“I wasn’t nominated for a Tony Award. It was a Drama Desk Award.”

“Whatever.” Chad shakes his head. “We’re going to enter the _Hamilton_ lottery and you’re gonna see a real Broadway show and have a real Broadway experience.”

“What, you don’t want to go see Phantom?”

The face Chad makes is absolutely worth it. Ryan doesn’t blame him, though. If his mother has kept a picture of Michael Crawford _in_ the fridge, he’d probably have weird hang-ups about the musical too. Maybe they’ll just watch the equally horrible 2004 movie with Gerard Butler on a date night. Chad will probably be more agreeable to the idea if they can throw popcorn at the screen and critique it.

“Don’t even joke, man. Hey, Troy and Gabi want to know if you’re free next Monday? They want to do dinner.”

“Sure.” He’s usually free on Mondays, just because most of his friends are now in the same show with him and they hang out outside of work enough that Mondays are sacred. “Do they drink? Should I bring wine?”

“You can if you want, but they’re social drinkers mostly.” Chad drains the rest of his cider before refilling the cup again. “Gabriella likes white wine and she’s the one you have to impress.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.” Ryan steal Chad’s glass and takes a sip before returning it. “Should I know anything before I meet them? Are they going to grill me about my intentions?”

“Probably only Troy. He started coaching kids and now he’s like a dad or something. The only reason he’s not a literal dad, I’m pretty sure, is because Gabriella is finishing up her PhD.”

Ryan is under the impression that meeting Troy and Gabriella is the equivalent to meeting Chad’s parents. While he mentions them sometimes, he gets the distinct impression that Chad’s relationship with them is strained. It doesn’t seem like something that he wants to talk about, though, so Ryan hasn’t directly asked about it. His family stuff is weird enough that they can keep talking about that until Chad is comfortable enough to explain what’s up with his. As it is, his mom has been trying to convince him to fly back to Nashville as soon as possible so that Chad can meet them.

That’s, uh. He loves his parents very dearly, but he’d rather not introduce them to Chad before he’s had a chance to decide whether or not this is a forever kind of deal. Maybe for Easter.

“I’m excited to meet them, then.”

—--

Chad comes by Ryan’s apartment an hour early, just because he has a feeling that Ryan will be stressing out over what to wear. When Ryan answers the door wearing an entire outfit, Chad is mildly surprised. He expected at least ten minutes of reassuring Ryan that yes, he looked fine and no, Troy and Gabriella wouldn’t care what he was wearing so much as they would care if Chad seemed happy.

“I made Sharpay yell at me,” Ryan says as he grabs a coat. “She and Peyton have reassured me I do, in fact, look good.”

“You do,” Chad says. He thinks Ryan looks good in almost anything, but he’s particularly fond of when Ryan pairs red and black. “Are you ready to go?”

“Peyton, I’m leaving!” Ryan pulls on his coat, then winds a scarf around his neck before nodding at Chad. “Okay, I’m ready.”

They tangle their fingers together and Ryan spends most of the subway ride telling Chad a story about how, when they were all in high school, there was a fight over who got the show solo for “Defying Gravity.” It’s funnier in retrospect, Ryan says, because they’re all literally _in_ the show and none of them are playing Elphaba. Chad thinks that the only one of them who could actually pull of Elphaba is Kurt—Rachel fits Galinda too neatly and Ryan could do act 1 Elphaba, but he’d probably find it harder to play both sides of her. He doesn’t have enough viciousness to be angry at the entire world. It’s why Enjolras wouldn’t suit him either.

When they reach Troy and Gabriella’s apartment, Troy opens the door and attempt to posture for about two second before Gabriella pushes him out of the way and hugs them both.

“I’ve heard so much about you, Ryan.” Gabriella takes Ryan’s hands in hers and smiling at him, the same bright and happy smile that disarms nearly everybody she meets. “But it was mostly from Chad, who watches YouTube videos of you when he misses you.”

“You watch YouTube videos of me?” Ryan looks over at him, eyes sparkling with mirth. “That’s so sweet.”

“Gabi,” Troy says, fond and exasperated, “let them come into our apartment so he can tell you all about himself.”

Gabriella lets them in and immediately has to check on something in the kitchen, leaving Ryan and Chad alone with Troy in the living room. Ryan doesn’t _look_ nervous, but he’s also an actor so Chad doesn’t know how much he can trust the normal tells he would look for. He takes Ryan’s hand in his anyway, lacing their fingers together.

“He’s the Timothée Chalamet one,” Troy says after a moment. “For some reason I thought he’d be the Armie Hammer one.”

“ _Grazie_ , I think?” Ryan tilts his head, confusion clear on his face. “I don’t quite follow your train of thought.”

“Chad said you were a _Call Me By Your Name_ gay and not a _Brokeback Mountain_ gay, which is a series of words I only understand because once a month Gabriella makes me watch a critically acclaimed movie with her so I can be _cultured_.” Troy shakes his head, and Chad snorts because he was there when Gabriella first decided on this and she’d literally said that. “We watched _Ladybird_ last time.”

“Have you seen _The Shape Of Water_ yet? It was my favorite Best Picture nomination from that year.” Ryan is animated in talking about film, and Chad should have known he would be. He must keep up with it, given that his sister is in so many of them. “I really love the way Guillermo del Toro does storytelling.”

“It’s on the list,” Gabriella calls from the kitchen. “We have to watch _Pan’s Labyrinth_ first.”

“I don’t know how he hasn’t seen that yet,” Chad says, “it’s like your favorite movie. Can you even marry him if he hasn’t seen your favorite movie?”

“I’m not marrying him for his taste in movies.” Gabriella comes in from the kitchen carrying four glasses of water on a tray, which she sets on the coffee table. “Anyway, don’t listen to Troy, he’s an uncultured jock. Tell me more about you.”

“Well, on the topic of movies, my favorite movie is actually _Aladdin_. The original, although I thought the recent remake was.” Ryan pauses in the way Chad’s learned to recognize as him trying to figure out a diplomatic way to say something. “It made some interesting choices, and I thought the two leads had excellent chemistry. I’m interested in the upcoming _Mulan_.”

“I would be more interested in it if the lead actress wasn’t so awful,” Gabriella says. She takes a sip of her water. “I’ll still go see it, but it’s hard to be excited for something when the lead actress is going around saying she supports the Chinese government.”

“Yeah, it’s unfortunate that the diverse movies are getting hit with some of the worst PR debacles because they should be uplifted for bringing more diversity and yet they’re being hit with actresses with unfortunate political opinions and racists running actresses off of social media. I can’t even talk, because we have one of the least diverse casts on Broadway and I’m sort of the problem? I don’t really have problems getting cast, but I can’t necessarily afford to turn down roles when if I do, they’ll just cast someone else who looks just like me.”

“It’s not really a problem at your level, anyway.” Gabriella smiles, the one that Chad thinks of as her “mom” smile. It means she’s not disappointed in _you_ , just the system. “It’s a problem at the casting level, where casting directors aren’t even seeing diverse candidates in some cases. That’s maybe not the best topic for light dinner conversation, though! Do you want to hear embarrassing stories of Chad from college?”

“Gabi, _please_.” The problem with being friends with people for too long is that they know all sorts of stories and it’s impossible to stop them from telling them. “Ryan doesn’t need to hear any of those stories.”

“Ryan absolutely needs to hear those stories,” he says. “Please tell me every embarrassing story you know.”

There’s a glint in Gabriella’s eyes that never bodes well, and she immediately launches into the story about the time he didn’t know astronomy and astrology were different things. Chad groans, because that’s only the tip of the iceberg, but secretly he can’t help but be glad that Ryan gets along with Troy and Gabriella. He doesn’t know what he would do if they didn’t.

—-- 

Dinner is weirdly easy.

Gabriella continues telling him stories about Chad and sometimes Troy in college, he interjects with some stories of his own, and it’s not anything like what his worst-case scenarios were. Which, he wasn’t really expecting it to be anything like the worst-case scenarios but he was expecting it to be significantly more strained than it was.

Instead, the conversation flows like they’ve been friends for years and the food is good—particularly Gabriella’s brownies, which are apparently her mother’s recipe and so good he would kill a man for them. Gabriella laughs when he says it and sends him home with the rest of the pan, despite Troy’s protests, and then they’re on the subway to Chad’s apartment and it’s. It doesn’t feel as fragile or awkward as he thought it would, and it occurs to him he might be able to trust his instincts that Chad isn’t going anywhere any time soon.

“Your friends are nice,” Ryan says as they’re walking to Chad’s apartment, brownies safely packed in Tupperware and clutched to his chest like the treasure they are. “I’m glad they seemed to like me.”

“You’re very likeable,” Chad says. He bumps their shoulders together and smiles like they’re sharing a secret. “So, what do you think? Ten more minutes?”

“I’ll take ten minutes for the rest of forever,” Ryan says and it surprises him how easy it is to say. It feels _right_ and that’s almost more surprising that the sentiment itself. “I don’t think I’m going anywhere.”

“You don’t still feel like this is too fast?”

That’s a slightly more complicated question. In some sense, Ryan does feel like they’re going too fast. He feels like they could move in together next month and get married in the spring and he’d be happy with that. That’s—he wants to go slower less because he thinks they should and more because he’s scared of how fast he’s fallen and how easy it’s been to do it. Going slower doesn’t seem to do anything for his fear, so at this point it seems like the best solution is to hit the ground with both feet running.

“ _Somehow I’ve fallen under your spell_ ,” Ryan sings, instead of directly answering, “ _and somehow I’m feeling it’s up that I fell._ ”

“Every moment, as long as you’re mine.” Chad stops Ryan with a hand on his shoulder and leans down to press their lips together. “I’m feeling wicked.”

“Yeah?” Ryan shifts the brownies in his arms around to hold out a hand. Chad takes it, tangling their fingers together. “Then we’d better get up to your apartment.”

Chad laughs, leading Ryan into his apartment building and not letting go until the apartment door has been closed behind them and the brownies have been carefully set on the kitchen counter. They leave clothes kind of everywhere on their way to the bedroom, where Chad presses Ryan down onto the bed and kisses him desperately while he lets Ryan prep him. One day, Ryan thinks, he’ll spread Chad out on the bed and just do this for hours to see the way that Chad gasps and shakes apart. They’ll have to try rimming too—it’s just the sort of thing that needs a little bit more prep than they’ve had time or patience for so far.

It’s been a while since he had time to learn somebody’s body and what works for them, so learning Chad’s body and the way he responds is reward enough for Ryan. Their schedules haven’t lined up so Ryan has a moment to truly wreck his throat yet, but Chad seems to enjoy giving more than receiving on that front. This, though, they haven’t really switched around yet—they will, if Ryan has anything to say about it, but for the moment Chad is content to get fucked and Ryan is fine with fucking him.

When Chad begs for Ryan, desperately trying to say whatever necessary, Ryan finally relents and guides Chad into place, lining him up and letting him sink down. There’s other sex positions, sure, but years of experimentation have taught Ryan that this usually works best for anyone he’s fucking. It certainly works for Chad, who gasps and moans brokenly as he rides Ryan. There’s a part of Ryan that wants to know if Chad could come just from that, but it feels cruel to leave Chad wanting so Ryan wraps his fingers around Chad and twists his hand in time with Chad’s movements.

“Chad,” he says, and it means so many things he’s not brave enough to say yet, but wants Chad to know. “ _Chad_.”

Chad’s lips part, and for a minute it seems like he’s going to say something but instead he bends forward to crush their lips together, and that’s an answer too. They might not mean the same thing, exactly, but they’re on the same page at least and _oh_ how he wants. He wants this, their bodies moving together and the feel of skin on skin, but he also wants to wake up next to Chad and see the way the morning sun hits his face. He wants to brave the _Hamilton_ ticket lottery for Chad, wants to whisk him away to Germany for a job, maybe, and those are things he can’t make his tongue say yet but he _wants_.

It’s overwhelming how much he feels for Chad—it’s not love, not quite, but it’s overwhelming and wild in a way that Ryan has never felt before. It’s been easy to pretend that he loves people on stage, where all he has to do is _believe_ and it comes across. This is different in the way it’s all-encompassing and warm, like being wrapped in the security and warmth of a blanket. He’s so caught up in it that it takes him by surprise when he comes and Chad follows like it’s _that_ easy.

“I love you,” Ryan says, once he’s caught his breath, and it doesn’t feel like a heavy statement. “Is that weird?”

“No,” Chad says. He kisses the corner of Ryan’s mouth. “I love you too.”

—--

Waking up in the morning is slow. He got moved from opening shift to the late morning shift, populated with tired college kids and people on early lunch, so he lets himself settle into the bed for a moment and it’s only when Ryan makes a displeased noise that Chad remembers there’s someone else in the bed with him at all. He stills, letting Ryan press closer to him, and it’s not even the first time he’s woken up in bed with someone else. He’s done it dozens of times, but it’s the first time he’s ever gently untangled himself from the person and crept into the kitchen to turn his electric kettle on.

In the space of his own apartment, Chad only keeps a French press, because he’s never seen the purpose of having an entire coffee machine for a single person. He thought about getting one of those single-serve machines, but that seemed wasteful so he settled on buying a French press and learning how to use it. The whole process is way simpler than the machines he has to use at work, it just took a little trial and error to figure out the ratio he liked best. 

Once the electric kettle finishes, he pours hot water into the French press to let it warm up while he measures out enough coffee grounds for two cups of coffee. Making his own is practically second nature, but he has to think a little about what to do for Ryan. It’s not that he doesn’t know how Ryan takes his coffee—Ryan does occasionally order things that aren’t a seasonal latte, but how that translates into the French press is a little up to Chad’s interpretation. Chad doesn’t have the proper equipment to make steamed milk, but he can still approximate the lattes that Ryan prefers. He brews the coffee itself slightly weaker and adds a little sugar before he adds a dash of milk to the cup. It’s probably not exactly right, but Ryan can be his guinea pig while he experiments with that works best.

Maybe he’ll buy a milk steamer and make Ryan a proper latte. 

Ryan is partially awake, blearily rubbing at his eyes, by the time that Chad brings the two cups of coffee back to the bedroom. He yawns when he takes the cup of coffee from Chad, immediately taking a sip. He probably doesn’t know the significance of the fact that Chad made him coffee at all, or the effort that Chad put into the gesture, and that’s fine. It’s not important—the fact that Ryan is the first and possibly only person who Chad has ever _wanted_ to make coffee for is his secret to keep.

First thing in the morning Ryan is too incoherent to have complex thoughts, anyway. He’d sort of warned Chad that was the case, the first time he’d spent the night, but it had still been startling how useless Ryan was in the mornings. Now that he’s gotten over the shock of it, though, Chad mostly finds the way Ryan’s eyes flutter shut and blink back open a little quirky and a lot adorable. It’s one of the little things about Ryan that Chad loves, the tiny things he only notices in degrees rather than the bombastic things like his surety and his convictions.

“Thanks,” Ryan says after his first few sips, “too nice.”

“I wanted to,” Chad says, and it’s the truth. He leans over and presses a kiss to Ryan’s cheek. “Good morning, sunshine.”

“Work?”

He squints at Chad like he’s trying to remember Chad’s work schedule, which is adorable. The fact that Ryan even remotely knows his schedule in his post-waking up fugue state is sweet, because Ryan has more important things to be worrying about. He doesn’t need to remember Chad’s vaguely volatile Starbucks schedule, at least not when he’s just waking up. It changes so much now that it’s properly the holiday season and there’s fewer people in the extremely early hours of the morning, but more people slighter later in the morning. Tourists don’t wake up at 6am, usually.

“I have a later shift today.” Chad doesn’t bother explaining what times he’s working, because Ryan is nearly incoherent for a good five minutes after he’s woken up and right now he doesn’t really resemble a human being yet. “I leave in about an hour.”

There’s a moment where Ryan merely blinks at him, like he’s trying to process what’s been said while he sips at his coffee. This isn’t the first time that Chad’s seen him trying to make sense of the world immediately after waking up, but it’s still new enough that it feels novel and like he learns something new every time. This morning, Chad notices the way Ryan’s throat works to swallow the coffee, stuttering like it’s too hot and he swallowed too quickly.

“Mkay.” The word is half mumbled into the coffee cup he’s drinking from, which is a more coherent response than some of the ones Chad has gotten from Ryan in the mornings. “Love you.”

Ryan already said it the night before, so part of Chad feels like he should be done being overwhelmed by the fact that Ryan _loves_ him, but something about the way that Ryan sleepily says it like it’s something he doesn’t have to even think about makes Chad’s heart clench. There’s still things they should probably talk about, and Chad should probably explain the situation with his parents because Ryan’s clearly curious but he hasn’t directly asked Chad about it yet. That’s a conversation they _can_ have later, though, because they’ve finally realized that they’re in this for the long haul.

Instead of saying any of that, though, he drinks his coffee and lets the moment sit. Distantly, Chad’s aware that he really needs to quickly shower before work, but he finds himself unwilling to rush the moment. It can wait. Everything can wait for ten more minutes.

“Yeah,” he says, “I love you too.”


End file.
